“I think at some point I had a big advantage but I couldn’t see how to play it,” Caruana says. “I think maybe (24. g3) was a mistake, but it’s also hard to say. Maybe I had chances after that as well, but it’s always very complicated because he’s attacking me and I always have to deal with a mating attack. So it’s not like I’m only playing for two results. If I make a mistake I could get mated.”

Carlsen: 'I was just so nervous'

“I felt that it was very close to mate. The problem is if I don’t mate I’m losing,” Carlsen says. “So I was trying to find some middle ground and my time was running out. I don’t know. I was just so nervous, I couldn’t make it happen. It ended up just being nothing.”

The champion is asked about Caruana’s opening novelty (12. b4), the first move to deviate from their eighth game.

“It was a new move,” Carlsen says. I thought I’d checked everything there after from previous games but apparently not. But I was not so unhappy to see it since I felt I that would just get a complicated game. And then at some point I was very happy with my position and I probably overestimated it and then I decided to just go crazy a little bit. I don’t know.”

He adds: “I was playing for a win and then immediately after (44. ... Kd4), I saw (45. Rb5) and I realized I was going to have to grovel for a draw. Fortunately, I managed to do that, but I think he could have put a stronger test to me.”

Carlsen moves his king after nearly 14 minutes and Caruana quickly responds with 45. Rb5. He’s looking very positive and confident with nearly twice as much time as Carlsen (who’s already below a quarter hour) and a suddenly optimistic position.

Caruana elevates the urgency with 45. Rb5 after a 10-minute think. If Carlsen had taken the challenger by surprise with 44. ... Kd4, then Caruana came close to returning the favor right here. Not least because the American is suddenly pressing! The champion will need to sacrifice a pawn and be incredibly accurate in defense to hold a draw.

“It’s going to be very hard to win with black,” grandmaster Judit Polgar says. Carlsen has been on the clock for more than 12 minutes now and he’s under a half hour. He grinding his gears trying to find a winning chance from the position, but all options appear drawish.

Carlsen moves up the h-rank with 43. ... h6 and Caruana meets him (44. h5).Says Susan Polgar: “I do not expect Carlsen to just give up, not try, and take a draw. He will try to squeeze this. But I also expect Caruana to put up a fierce defense all the way!”

The engines have had it dead even for the last 20 moves. Nothing in the last back-and-forth (41. ... Rc6 42. Ra6 Ke5 43. Kg3) changes that, but Russian grandmaster Peter Svidler offers a warning: “My hands would be very shaky with white in this position. It’s very, very scary.”

The players are seated again and Caruana opens what feels like the second act with 41. g4. The position does look (dare we say) drawish, but black does have winning chances. And if there’s a chance to slam the door on this match then you can believe the champion, whether the Carlsen of three years ago or today’s iteration, will go for it.

Jonathan Tisdall (@GMjtis)

The accuracy rate, even in punch-ups like this one, is borderline machine high. Hard to say what it will take to win a game here. A tragic oversight, or shattering nerves? Armageddon? #CarlsenCaruana2018

The players have reached time control after move 40

The players scramble toward the time control (38. ... Rc8 39. Ra3 Kf7) as the game enters the fifth hour. Now Caruana needs to make one more move. He’s down to 30 seconds ... 20 seconds ... 10 seconds. And he finally plays 40. Kh2 with eight seconds remaining! Another 50 minutes of time and he immediately springs from his chair to the refreshment area. Carlsen plays 40. ... Ke6 and joins him. We’ve got an empty playing hall for the moment.

Carlsen on the clock after 34. Rb2 Rb7 35. Rd1. The champion is under two minutes. One and a half minutes ... and he plays 35. ... Qe2 with 1min 11sec on the clock. He’s back to 1min 41sec after the increment.

Both players are under 10 minutes

Caruana and Carlsen are both under 10 minutes after 30. Rb5 Bd8. They will both have to make one move per minute including the increment to reach the time control after move 40 (when they are both given an additional 50 minutes under Fide’s match regulations).

A quick flurry of moves including equal trades of pawns and bishops: 27. Bf1 Bxf1 28. Qxf1 Qxd5 29. Rxb4 Qe6. Carlsen with the clear upper hand thanks to advantages in position and time. “Magnus may not be winning,” British IM Thomas Rendle says, “but every serious chessplayer would pick Black here.”

Caruana plays 25. Rb3 but spends more than 10 minutes on it. He’s going to need to be faster in this critical period. Carlsen needs only two minutes to hit back with 25. … Bh3. Time pressure mounting for both players.

Thomas Rendle (@TERendle)

This game could end in a draw still - but can we agree now, once and for all, this is not a dull match in need of 'fixing' somehow?! This is brutal, top-level chess at it's very best. #CarlsenCaruana

Carlsen plays 24. ... b4. That leaves him with 17min 29sec to make his next 15 moves before the players are given an additional 50 minutes after move 40. Caruana on 29 minutes (and counting) as he ponders his 25th move. Sesse has it dead even.

Caruana plays 24. g3 after more than 18 minutes. It’s not exactly a crowd-pleaser, but it makes sense. Time is becoming a mounting factor. “I don’t see how this can really be drawn,” Nakamura says. “Someone’s going to win and someone’s going to lose.”

Susan Polgar (@SusanPolgar)

This is why I tried to explain and many fans simply refuse to believe. When players are in immense pressure, they start to see things that are not there. Nerves can play tricks in humans' minds. If Caruana is playing a 2000 player, he would not hesitate to capture on b5. pic.twitter.com/rKFtT9Reuw

Carlsen goes for the kill (23. … Qg5!?)

So now the $64,000 question is will Caruana capture Carlsen’s pawn on b5. Susan Polgar says it’s a blunder and premature. A critical point in the game and the match. Caruana has been pondering and calculating for more than 15 minutes and his time advantage is down to nothing. “You’ve just got to go for it,” American grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura says. “There’s nothing else you can do in this position.”

Olimpiu G. Urcan (@olimpiuurcan)

After 23...Qg5, you need to have vibranium running through your veins to play 24.Bxb5 in game ten of the world championship.

Caruana plays 22. Nb6 after 14 minutes, but he’s still more than an a quarter hour ahead on the clock. After a knight exchange (22. ... Nxb6 23. Bxb6), Carlsen expends another six minutes before continuing the attack with 23. ... Qg5. Interestingly, that swings the advantage dramatically to white according to Sesse.

Carlsen goes all in (21. … b5)!

And 21. … b5 is on the board! Surprise! Carlsen spent 15 minutes before playing a move that no one saw coming. It sacrifices a pawn but in doing so removes a rook that’s been confounding black’s attacking ideas. He immediately springs from his chair and walks to the snack and refreshment area. Surely he’s pushing for a win today!

Carlsen sets the game on fire with 21. ... b5. Photograph: Fide

Simon Williams (@ginger_gm)

...b5! The crowd goes crazy! That's the way chess should be played. 😍 #CarlsenCaruana

Carlsen advances his pawn 20. ... e4 after about 17 minutes, furthering his kingside initiative. Caruana immediately responds with 21. Kh1 to escape a potential pin. Here’s what we’re looking at. “The game is very sharp, and it’s not what Magnus likes,” Garry Kasparov says. “Because now he has to make some tough choices which is not typically his style.”

Carlsen brings out his queen with 19. ... Qg6, threatening an kingside attack. Caruana is going to think about this one for a bit. After nearly a quarter hour, he decides on 20. Bc7. Sesse does not like that move for white, throwing a significant advantage to Carlsen for the first time today.

Susan Polgar (@SusanPolgar)

Well, Carlsen's plan is pretty clear. The idea is Nf6, e4 & trying to do something on the K side. Not sure what is Caruana's plan with 19. Ra3 especially when there are no square for the Rook in the K side. That was a curious move for me. I guess we just have to wait and see! 🤔 pic.twitter.com/7ZxsQ3BRZI

Tricky positions for both players. Carlsen has been on the clock for more than 10 minutes since Caruana’s 19. Ra3, which is a move the engines did not like one bit. The Norwegian supercomputer Sesse, running Stockfish, assesses the position after it had hovered above +0.50 since move 14.

Carlsen plays 18. ... Qe8 and Caruana is back in the tank again. More than 17 minutes pass before the American opts for 19. Ra3. The players are just about level on time.

Ian Rogers (@GMIanRogers)

"In terms of chess understanding, this is what I would assess we are the most different on; he values the centre a lot,” said Carlsen of Caruana before their London world title match. In game 10, Carlsen has the centre but Caruana has the edge.

Caruana plays 18. Bb6 after spending eight minutes weighing his response to 17. ... f4. It’s his longest think of the day. It’s unclear if he’s out of his prep or just using some of his time advantage to make sure he’s precise. The Dutch grandmaster Anish Giri has an interesting theory: “You know what’s a bad sign for Magnus? A bad sign is that Fabi is thinking. It means the move is not suggested by the computer. It shows the move is probably not good.”

Caruana establishing space advantage on the queenside and the potential for counterplay with 15. ... Ra8 16. Be3 f5 17. a5 f4. He’s more than 20 minutes ahead on the clock with more time than he started with thanks to the 30-second increment after each move.

13...a5 14. bxa5 Rxa5 15. Nc4 Carlsen is OK in this position. The problem is it is so concrete, which is not Carlsen's strength, and Caruana is clearly in his preparation. So it is like fighting with your hands tied. 😃 pic.twitter.com/gHou3YbVz7

Game 10 opens with another Sicilian!

And we’re off with 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4. We’re into the Sicilian and it’s not the Rossolimo. And with 4. ... Nf6 5. Nc3 e5, we’re into the Sveshnikov variation. This is the same line as Game 8.

Preamble

Hello and welcome to Game 10 of the World Chess Championship between Norway’s Magnus Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana of the United States. We’re looking at a 4½-all deadlock after nine games in 13 days, no closer to a verdict than when we started. We have, however, borne witness to a bit of history: The nine straight draws represent the longest streak of games to open a match without a decisive result in the recognized 132-year history of world championship matches.

Quick guide

World Chess Championship 2018

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The players

Norway's Magnus Carlsen is defending the world chess championship against Fabiano Caruana of the United States. The best-of-12-games match is taking place at the College in Holborn between 9 and 28 November, with the winner earning a 60% share of the €1m ($1.14m) prize fund if the match ends in regulation (or 55% if it's decided by tie-break games).

Carlsen, 27, has been ranked No 1 for eight straight years and was considered the world’s best player even before he defeated Viswanathan Anand for the title in 2013. Caruana, 26, is ranked No 2, having earned his place at the table by winning the candidates tournament in March. No American-born player has won or even competed for the world title since Bobby Fischer in 1972.

It marks the first title match between the world's top two players since 1990, when Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov faced off for a fifth and final time.

The format

The match will consist of 12 classical games with each player awarded one point for a win and a half-point for a draw. Whoever reaches six and a half points first will be declared the champion.

The time control for each game is 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, 50 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game plus an additional 30 seconds per move starting from move 1. Players cannot agree to a draw before Black's 30th move.

If the match is tied after 12 games, tie-breaks will be played on the final day in the following order:

• Best of four rapid games with 25 minutes for each player with an increment of 10 seconds after each move.

• If still tied, they will play up to five mini-matches of two blitz games (five minutes for each player with a three-second increment).

• If all five mini-matches are drawn, one sudden-death 'Armegeddon' match will be played where White receives five minutes and Black receives four minutes. Both players will receive a three-second increment after the 60th move. In the case of a draw, Black will be declared the winner.

A brief recap of how we got here: Game 1 was a grueling seven-hour, 115-move staredown, where Carlsen nearly become the first defending champion to win the opening game of a world championship with the black pieces in 37 years. The next four contests – Game 2, Game 3, Game 4 and Game 5 – were mostly safer, straightforward affairs where Caruana was able to get his teeth in the match. The tension ramped up in Friday’s Game 6 when Carlsen was outplayed by Caruana in the middlegame and pushed to the limit before saving a draw with incredibly precise defending. They played to another draw in Sunday’s Game 7, a result that left the champion lamenting his gun-shy play as white. In Monday’s Game 8, Carlsen found himself down nearly an hour on the clock facing a dangerous position as black, until one false step by the American allowed him to hold for a draw. Then came yesterday’s Game 9, where it was Caruana’s turn to suffer until he was bailed out by a Carlsen inaccuracy and held for another peaceful result.

Nine games, nine draws. Will today be the day that first blood is finally drawn? We’ll soon find out when Caruana makes the first move as white at the top of the hour.

Bryan will be here shortly. In the meantime here’s his report from Wednesday’s ninth game.

A freshly bruised Magnus Carlsen came dangerously close to landing a decisive blow in Wednesday’s ninth game of his tightly wound defense of the world chess championship against Fabiano Caruana in London, until a moment of impatience allowed his opponent off the hook and left the best-of-12-games match no closer to resolution in a 4½-all deadlock.

The 27-year-old champion, sporting a bandage over a black eye absorbed in a collision with a Norwegian journalist during a kickabout on Tuesday’s rest day, harried the American challenger out of his preparation early and pushed him to the brink of disaster in the middlegame, but one rushed misstep gifted Caruana the slack he required to hold for a 58-move draw with three classical games remaining and the gnawing spectre of a tie-breaker looming ever larger.

“I felt like I had a comfortable advantage and then I just blew it,” a clearly disappointed Carlsen said in the immediate aftermath. “I was poor.”